Charlie,
I ran into the same problem and the solution lies in waiting until the last step tp glue those aft plastic carrier bearings to their hull supports. With them glued in place first, you're forcing everything forward of that point to follow that line in order to get a smooth rotation. This has forced you to mount the shafts too low in the hull...thus your clearence problem. I'd recommend breaking them loose and then getting your shafts into a proper position. Once there, tack everything and re test before you do the final glueing. This process worked well for me.

Charlie, just a heads up, I got an email delvery error on a mail destined for you.
probably because someone sent you a PM which causes you to be mailed.
please check whether the email in your profile is still accurate.

Not much to report. Need a ESC. Probably will go with a proboats unit that kevin Price mentioned. I have an idea for some mods to the hull of the Gato but I will been a new model. That's OK as I intend to get one for the conning tower that I need for the Marlin.

The Pro Boat is a good ESC but the start is not very slow and depending on your setup she will lerch a bit but it will run great.
Im looking into a better one like the Aqucrafts ESC very slow starts but the reverse is a bit underpowered.,but great value.
Dave

"I like submarine comanders ,they don't have time for bull!!" and
"Don't tell me it can't be done!"

Into the drink with her! Here is the first water trials. Sat a little low aft and listed to starboard but other than that and it sank it was OK. Turned out I had the ballast vet servo set slightly open which allowed a slow sink.

I finally did the forward rails. I had read in Fine Scale Modeler that you can use fishing line, Strands of copper or brass wire or even steel wire. The copper worked well for this. As yo can see I broke the sights on one side of the gun. I will glue some copper wire to the underside and see if that fixes it and adds strength as this is the second time I broke the same side. You can see the broken scope on the work bench. The gun you see is the aft gun which I had ordered from Revel from their web site.

Got her all together and took her to the 2009 regatta. I will post some of the photos of the last part of the build and plan to take photos of my planned mods but for right now enjoy the under way and under water shot.